The present invention relates to an apparatus for cleaning shothoods during the production of casting molds or core packets that are ready for casting, by means of core shooters or shooter stations that are preferably arranged in line, each of the core shooters incorporating a shot hood that comprises a shot plate and shot nozzles, it being possible to uncouple the shot hood from the core shooter and lay it on a pallet or the like, with the nozzles pointing downward. In addition, the present invention relates to a procedure for using the apparatus according to the present invention.
In principle, the present invention relates to the field of casting technology. In order to cast shaped pieces, casting cores are in most instances manufactured in separate parts, combined, and then joined together to form a casting mold or a core packet. Then, in order to produce, for example, metal work pieces, these core packets are filled with molten metal, whereafter, in series production, the core packets that are to be filled with molten metal pass through the production line lined up one behind the other.
Apparatuses to manufacture core packets of the type under discussion herein are already known from numerous publications. Solely as an example, reference is made herein to DE-OS 23 04 564. Also known from practice is the fact that the cores that are to be joined together to form a core packet are produced in a production line with a series of core shooters or shooting stations that incorporate a plurality of shot hoods, when the core packet has an additional core added to it at each shooting station that incorporates a shot hood. To this end, the cores are laid on a transit element that passes through the individual shooting stations when, in most instances, this transit element simultaneously serves as the tool lower section of the first shooting station.
The sand that is used to shoot the cores or to make up the core packets is always mixed with binding agent, this causing on the one hand, considerable soiling of the tools--the tool upper section with the ejector blade and the tool lower section--and, on the other hand, the shot hoods--shot plates and shot nozzles. Accordingly, in addition to the tools, the shot hoods also have to be cleaned from time to time and to this end removed from the shooting stations and replaced. In the event that the type of core to be shot is changed, there will also be a tool change as well as a hood change so that the shot hoods that have been replaced will also have to be cleaned. Practice has shown that such a shot-hood change or the subsequent cleaning of the shot hoods is always problematic if fully automatic manufacture and thus fully automatic shot-hood cleaning is attempted. On the one hand, manipulation of the shot hoods is problematic and, on the other hand, the cleaning has to be carried out as quickly as possible, despite complicated handling procedures, although this has to be done without contaminating the environment with the core sand that remains in the shot hoods.
For this reason, it is an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus of the type described in the introduction hereto, and an appropriate procedure, by which rapid and at the same time fully automatic shot-hood cleaning is made possible while avoiding environmental contamination.